standing idle. Even 90% of the time as much as 60% of the generating capacity is idle. This large investment of approximately $3,000,000 is required to insure continuous service to our customers during periods of low water or breakdown of generating capacity. Not only is it necessary to install this equipment but it is necessary to maintain a skilled operating force of sufficient size to operate the station to capacity throughout the year as it is impossible to predict for even a short time in advance, the load which will be thrown on the station. The table (page 150) gives in a condensed form the operating results for each year from 1910 to 1920, the figures for 1920 being for ten months. This table brings out some interesting results. In August 1918 Station 3 generated more kilowatt hours than was generated by all the Company's electric stations in any year period prior to 1913. Although the installed generating capacity in kilowatts increased 233% from 1910 to 1920, the boiler capacity required to operate this higher generating capacity increased only 31%. The maximum monthly output increased 3132% although the installed generating capacity required for this generation increased only 233% or 80% less than the generation. Although the coal costs increased 82%, the cost of coal per kilowatt hour due to more efficient apparatus and better operation decreased 412%. While the installed generating capacity in the engine room increased 233%, the cost of engine room labor increased only 57% due to the use of larger units and simpler design. Although boiler room labor increased 250% and engine room labor 57%, the cost of boiler and engine room labor per kilowatt hour decreased 5912%. Based on the index figures used by the Department of Labor, the average rate of pay from 1910 to 1920 increased 74.7%. At the same time our unit cost of labor per kilowatt hour decreased 5912%. These operating figures show the wisdom of the Management in adopting the policy of extending our steam generating equipment and the soundness of the engineering design, construction and operation. Figure 6 shows graphically the increase in cost of coal per ton and the decrease in cost of coal per kilowatt hour from 1910 to 1920. The decrease in cost of coal per kilowatt hour from 1913 to 1914 was due to the better operation of the more efficient additions made to Station 3 over the old equipment displaced. In 1917 there was a sharp rise in coal prices with a corresponding rise in cost of coal per kilowatt hour. Figure 7 shows graphically the relation between labor rates based on figures taken from the reports of the Department of Labor and our engine and boiler room labor costs per kilowatt hour As in the case of figure eight, the drop off in kilowatt hour cost in 1914 is due to the better operation of the additional more efficient capacity installed at Station 3. The increase in kilowatt hour costs in 1915 was due to the very low kilowatt hour generation for that year. The sharp decrease in 1916 was due to the large kilowatt hour generation for that year, being the heaviest generation of any year up to that date. In 1917 although labor rates increased materially, the kilowatt hour generation likewise increased and the kilowatt hour costs changed only a small amount. In 1918 labor rates rose still more sharply but this year was a year of unusually heavy generation as we were feeding power back into the Niagara system instead of taking power from it. This gave us an unusually good load factor so that the kilowatt hour generation increased 1 the generation of power and other definite portions to the generation of steam. There is a definite advantage derived from this combination load on the operation of the station as a whole, i. e., due to the steam generaated for heating and industrial purposes, the electrical load is carried more economically than would otherwise be the case and the converse of this is true. Therefore, the division of certain costs is not capable of absolutely definite assignment, and comparisons made between the figures given and figures for other straight electrical generating stations. are likely to be misleading. IRREFUTABLE LOGIC "The great majority of people affected have realized that the utilities' expenses like their own have expanded, compelling increased revenues. There are some, however, who cheerfully pay $12 for a pair of shoes for which they formerly paid $5, 50 cents for a beefsteak for which they formerly paid 20 cents, and who complain bitterly if the cost of a utility's commodity is increased 25 cents per month, and accuse the Commission of favoritism toward the company if any increase whatever is allowed to meet growing wages and material prices. They seem to forget that the bulk of the expense in operating most utilities is labor, and that each member of the great army engaged in rendering public service is compelled to purchase the necessities of life at the same high cost that confronts us all. In fact, increases have been permitted by this Commission for the sole purpose of affording employees a living wage. "We realize that it is not a popular thing to increase rates. It would be easy to deny such applications and pose dramatically as friends of the people, standing between them and corporate greed We occupy a position of great responsibility. We have it in our power to bring ruin and disaster to many hundreds of utilities and rend the financial fabric of the state It is very difficult now to secure capital for public service enterprise, and this Commission, by a rash stroke of the pen, could make it impossible in the state of Washington. We have endeavored in these trying times to save legitimate investment in utility properties from ruin, preserve the necessary public service to the people, and, at the same time, be just and fair to the patrons who pay the price If we should yield to the clamor of politicians, whose stock in trade is reckless denunciation of public utilities and abuse of the Commission for permitting them to live, the results would frighten even those irresponsible agitators." From opinion in Case of Wenatchee V Central Washington Gas Co. P. U. R. 1920 C 871. Decided by Washington Public Service Commission. GAS AND ELECTRIC NEWS of capital, together with the undivided energies of thirteen hundred employees has scores of major operations and hundreds of less important ramifications. It is the earnest desire of the management of the Company that stockholders, employees and public alike become as fully informed as possible concerning all of them. Romance in Business Electric Distribution THE Gas and Electric Industries Gas Manufacture Electric Construction FRANCES MURPHY. Housekeeping Suggestions (Home Economics Bureau, Chamber of Commerce) Material may be copied provided credit is given "The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth." -From General Oath of Witness. Company Information UR innovation of last month, in sending this magazine to all stockholders of the Corporation, was very obviously to the benefit of all concerned. We are consequently sending copies of this issue to all stockholders. Following closely the receipt of Series B Preferred Stock Dividend No. 11 it will probably be again received with interest and satisfaction. The necessity for reasonable brevity requires comparatively brief consideration of many of the subjects treated in this and other issues. Accordingly interested stockholders are invited to ask for additional information on subjects having a special appeal, to the end that each investor in the Company may have an accurate and satisfactory conception of it. This technical and complex business absorbing thirty million dollars are truly, "Romances of Business. Each together with other vast Public Utility enterprises has been built up step by step by hard labor from simple beginnings based upon the elementary visions of scientific investigators when the scientific world was young. From laboratory toys there has been evolved the complex and ponderous systems which are to a large extent the burden bearers of the modern world. There is for some of us a keen intellectual gratification in this mastery of nature. Every art and profession, every trade and almost every kind of human labor has made its contribution to and is served by our business. Electricity, itself unknown, and Gas, whose molecular structure we do not fully understand, are very intimately connected with all human activity. Ideas have perpetrated themselves in our immensely valuable concrete tools. Ideals, fostered through the spirit of scientific truth have broadened into our equally valuable personal relations with each other. "Service" has through our industry, received its true interpretation. Our modern scientists tell us that, in connection with our business, "We have simply scratched the surface." We are then the torch bearers of our age, utilizing the work of our predecessors in contributing to the comfort of our fellow men today, and laying the foundation for greater W THAT is Christmas to a business organization? It may be many things, but it certainly is a holiday of importance. To Christianity we owe much of our modern civilization. Through it the world is a better place to live in, and a better place to do business. Regardless of its promises for the hereafter it enriches life today. As Christianity makes our Company possible, so the Company, in common with other Public Utilities, adds much to the satisfactions of the holiday. Through light, heat, power, transportation and the transmission of intelligence, friends and relatives are brought closer together, are fed, warmed and entertained. From the luxuries of the past to the necessities of today our products have assumed colossal proportions in war and peace, in business and recreation, in culture, ethics and religion. While our business consists in the practical transformation of the material resourses of the earth, we are cognizant of our obligation to spiritual forces. To meet this obligation we operate insofar as possible through the cheerful observance of the most enlightened ethics. Life's Greatest Treasure the young, but it is true to a remarkable extent among the middle aged, who have by experience learned many of life's other pointed lessons. In one sense it is a useless, thankless and presumptuous task to continually remind our patient readers of their obligation to safeguard health, but the daily contact which the nature of our work makes for us with the victims of careless living constrains us to preach and preach again. We do not in general fail to keep our health through ignorance! We know the amazingly few and simple rules of health. They have been bulletined, placarded, and printed until it is literally true that "He who runs may read!" Must we keep on learning, only through bitter and continued self experience, that good health is life's greatest treasure, that it is within the power of most of us to acquire and conserve it, but that far too many learn too late? Dr. Hatfield Says "Getting up ten minutes earlier in the morning will add greatly to your efficiency throughout the day and mean much more than that amount of time stolen from yourself for an extra nap. Persons getting out of bed with just enough time to grab their clothes, hastily throw them on and gorge down a sandwich, with a cup of coffee too hot, feeling all the time the push and strain of the hour to be at work, will punish themselves all the morning with a nervousness, headache, indigestion, and a consequent low efficiency. This will last not only through the morning, but all during the day-for a bad start in the morning gives a poor appetite at noon, and, as a result, a bad day. "Learn to eat for the good of your WHEN one is well he seldom vol- mind and body, and not, as if it were untarily pays much attention to health. This is especially true of an act to get over three times a day." -The Lilly Balance. |